


Quidam Diabolus (The Never Sated Remix)

by Daegaer



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: 13th Century CE, Angels, Demons, Gen, Humor, Poetry, Remix, Temptation, The Arrangement, Writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-30
Updated: 2011-04-30
Packaged: 2017-10-18 19:55:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Daegaer/pseuds/Daegaer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aziraphale tries his hand at a little light tempting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quidam Diabolus (The Never Sated Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ineffabilitea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ineffabilitea/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Quidam Diabolus](https://archiveofourown.org/works/109280) by [Ineffabilitea](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ineffabilitea/pseuds/Ineffabilitea). 



> Thank you to Puddingcat for beta-reading!

_How should I go about this?_ Aziraphale thought, anxiously running his hands over his hair, and hoping he looked presentable. Or evil. Or maybe not - surely it would give the game away to appear with hooves and horns? It might be laying things on a bit too thick.

"Damn you, Crowley," he muttered, then looked guiltily upwards. "Er, but not any more than normal."

He could do this, he told himself. He _could_. He _shouldn't_ , but, well, it wasn't as if the whole silly idea hadn't been his plan originally. It had all seemed so simple at the time, a nice way of getting a little more reading time for himself, but now - He sighed. Crowley was right. If he was going to perform miracles - even just a few minor healings - then Aziraphale had to do a little tempting. And this particular piece of tempting should be easy, even if it went _particularly_ against Aziraphale's grain. Crowley had laughed at how simple it should be to distract a schoolboy from his homework, and had laughed more at Aziraphale's horror at _stopping_ someone reading.

 _Here goes nothing,_ Aziraphale thought, and made himself visible to the boy, who immediately leapt up from his desk with the air of a teenager who would gladly clutch at any straw possible to keep himself afloat in a sea of Vulgar Latin.*

"Where did you come from?" the boy said. "And can you write poetry?"

"Er," Aziraphale said. "Pardon?"

"I have to write a poem! In Latin! In a good classical style! But I hate poetry, and I'd rather be outside with my friends. I'm going to be beaten till I can't sit down if I don't write this horrid thing, and I really, really _can't_ \- so if you know poetry, will you write it for me?" the boy said. "I'll give you a kiss -"

This was going better than expected, Aziraphale thought. There was really nothing to this tempting business - he hadn't said a word on the topic in hand and the little chap was already neglecting the books. He'd expected it to be more of a struggle. Doing someone's homework for them seemed rather a _major_ sin to lead them into, but he supposed he should show willing for the sake of his and Crowley's little arrangement.

"Actually, I'm not a bad poet," he said modestly, then frowned. "I'll give you a hand - but you don't have to kiss me, thank you very much."

"Are you sure?" the boy said with what seemed practiced innocence. "Some of the younger monks -"

"Just give me the stylus!" Aziraphale said.

He sat at the desk and regarded the wax tablets, sadly noting that at the moment the wax was scored not with even the most basic attempt at poetry, but rather with all the dirty words the lad knew. He miracled the wax smooth and clean again and tapped the stylus against his lips, thinking. He really should at least make a token effort at this tempting lark, he told himself.

"Look here, are you prepared to do what I say if I write this thing for you?"

The boy regarded him through narrowed eyes. "If you want more than a kiss it has to be at least forty lines long and with no spelling mistakes," he said with flat finality.

"For the last time, there will be no kissing!" Aziraphale snapped. He regarded the smooth blank surface of the wax in annoyance** and felt every scrap of suitable poetry flee his mind. _Poetry_ , he thought, feeling some embarrassment grow as the boy looked at him expectantly. _Classical poetry. Which Roman poets did I talk to? And which of them would be a believable model for a teenager? Hmm._ He tapped the stylus against his lips again, hummed and hawed a while longer, and finally jumped up, grabbed the boy by his shoulders and turned him around. "I can't think with you reading over my shoulder," he whinged. He sat down again and faced the fearsome blank wax. Finally he decided that if he was going to cheat, he was going to _cheat_. _No one reads that Catullus fellow any more_ , he thought guiltily, _It's not as if anyone will catch me out - er, I mean, well, umm - oh, blast it!_

He wrote fluidly and quickly, filling both sides of the tablet with line after line of verse. It looked rather good, he thought, sitting back.

"There," he said, and the boy swooped on the tablets with glee. "You should probably copy that out in your own writing."

The boy read, sounding out the lines under his breath, his eyes growing wider and wider. He put the tablets down and looked at Aziraphale with what, Aziraphale thought, was far too interested an eye.

"Are you _sure_ you don't want a kiss?" he asked.

 

* * *

 

"What did you _do?_ " Crowley howled, pacing up and down Aziraphale's study. "One simple little warm-up temptation, I said! Distract a schoolboy from his homework, I said! Did I ask you to get him to sell his soul?" He clutched his head. "Do you have any idea of the parchmentwork involved?" He waved a suddenly-materialised thick sheaf of vellum sheets at Aziraphale. "This is the _short_ form! Which should be filled out in triplicate! In blood! Hell may take I.O.U.s, Aziraphale, but you have to fill out the forms eventually! And _I_ don't like I.O.U.s, especially not written in watered down red ink and with a very bad forgery of my signature!"

"I thought it was quite a good forgery," Aziraphale sniffed.

"This arrangement was meant to make things easier for us, not create more work! I'll be clearing this up for weeks!"

"Stop being so overly excitable," Aziraphale said. "In the circumstances it was the only thing I could do, if I wanted to get out of there with my chast - er, my professional integrity intact. You wanted me to do some tempting, and I did. I can't help it if I'm a natural."

Crowley looked at him sidelong. "I can't believe you just said you were naturally good at tempting people to damnation," he said after a moment.

" . . . Neither can I," Aziraphale said. "Let's go for a drink and forget I said it. You can tell me who you want me to tempt next, and I'll do my best to be very incompetent."

"Aziraphale," Crowley said, pinching the bridge of his nose, "I am not letting you anywhere _near_ any of my work for at least fifty years. And even then it won't be without close supervision. I don't think I can handle the stress."

"Oh. Good," Aziraphale said, cheerfully. "By the way, it's your turn to do a favour for me."

"You angels have some cheek," Crowley said, rolling his eyes. "What makes you think I'm going to do you a favour after this?"

"I know a charming little taverna in Brindisi," Aziraphale said. "Excellent seafood, excellent wine - I'll treat you to lunch."

Crowley sighed. "Oh, all right," he said with bad grace.*** "You can treat me to dinner too. In fact, you'll be buying my drinks for the foreseeable future, and helping me wriggle out of this bureaucratic mess."

Aziraphale smiled beatifically. That seemed like a _much_ better prospect than dealing with children.

 

* * * * * * * * *

 

*Although Aziraphale really only got _very_ vulgar after the fourth bottle of Rhenish wine.

**It melted a little as if it had come in contact with hot sulphur, but Aziraphale never ever admitted this to himself. And certainly not to Crowley.

***Which was usually the only kind of grace he could manage.

**Author's Note:**

> Catullus' (frequently obscene) poetry was not, it seems, that well known through much of mediaeval Europe. Aziraphale is on fairly safe ground for avoiding plagiarism charges. The remix title is taken from the following, more romantic, poem:
> 
> Poem 48
> 
> Iuventius, if I were always allowed  
> to kiss your honey-sweet eyes,  
> I might kiss you three hundred  
> thousand times, and never be sated,  
> not even if my kisses were more  
> than the crop’s ripe ears of wheat.


End file.
